3rd Generation Partnership Projection (3GPP) Long Term Evolution (LTE) broadcast is a key technology enabler for effective utilization of radio spectrum, as well as utilization of access and core network resources that are deployed to provide mobility services in the telecommunication operator's Internet Protocol (IP) mobility network infrastructure. As LTE network deployments become widespread and mature globally, rapid advances in radio technologies such as 5G and small cells will pave the way for innovative ways of coordinating and utilizing these critical network resources to be able to deliver high-speed mobile multimedia broadcast multicast services. The volume of cell sites (macro eNodeBs and small cells) in the network continues to grow to meet the radio-sector capacity needs as well as serve the traffic demands from mobile customers.
One way to deal with growing demand is to provide multicast and broadcast services. LTE has defined evolved Multimedia Broadcast and Multicast Services (eMBMS) to support broadcast/multicast services in cellular networks. LTE utilizes Multicast Broadcast Single Frequency Network (MBSFN) to broadcast the same information using the same radio resources from synchronized neighboring base stations.
Allocation of spectrum resources to broadcast operations may be static. For example, a particular cell may devote 20% of available spectrum to broadcast and 80% to service unicast operations. The static allocation of resources may adversely affect both broadcast and unicast operations by misallocating scarce radio resources. Such misallocation can be more critical in dense urban locations where cells are starved of suitable LTE spectrum resources.